


Fragments

by Poinsettia



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, Dark, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-10
Updated: 2016-09-10
Packaged: 2018-08-14 04:56:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,175
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7999369
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Poinsettia/pseuds/Poinsettia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A victorious Dark Lord. A hero locked up in a tower. Life is not a fairytale.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Fragments

Hogwarts fell on All Hallows' Eve under an onslaught of fire, horror and magic. At the time, I was seventeen years old, and I truly believed—as we all do at that age—that the nightmare would not last forever. I did not understand—as I do now—that some things last forever.

Take time, for example: An eternity of winters and never enough springs. And when the morning after I look at myself in the mirror, I no longer recognize the Boy Who Was staring back at me. If I ever slept in a cupboard under the stairs, it surely was in another life. Warm, hand-knitted sweaters and the miraculous tears of a phoenix, I only remember in dreams. From my window, on top of an un-fairytale castle, I observe the world lying at my feet... It is not a dream. 

“Thinking again, my treasure?” 

Freezing hands pull me back from the window, its glass enchanted to be unbreakable, and cradle me against a body whose cold I can feel through layers of soft cashmere and heavy silk. I have been unable to feel warm since they brought me here.

“You’re shivering. Come, let us seat together next to the fire”.

A fire that combusts but is not allowed to burn you, that blazes but never warms you. It is yet another chink in the illusion that surrounds me. Feather pillows, unbelievably soft bed sheets, exquisitely crafted furniture, meals fit for a king, clothes that cost a small fortune, more books than is possible to read in a lifetime… And a small, shinning emerald, cold and heavy against my chest, powering this burning inferno.

“You look pale. Did you take your medicine during lunch?”

I nod.

Since they brought me here, I have not spoken a single word. When they have taken everything away from you; when words, and screams, and the tears all fall on deaf ears… What is the point? And if, on top of everything, He hates it: that the only sound He is able to wrench from my lips when He takes my body or uses my magic is nothing but a soundless sigh… What is there to say?

“I have news for you. Good news, I think.”

His eyes stare at me and I stare back at Him. I do not love Him, and I do not fear Him, and I look at Him because there is nothing else to look at except motionless paintings and prision-like walls.

“Weasley and his people have surrendered. They’ll be here tomorrow to plead their loyalty. Draco will come for you. I wish you to be there.”

Neither name brings forward a reaction. I accept both as the earth accepts the rain. They are just part of a much bigger, more complex game. If the last stronghold of the Resistance is to fall, let it fall. It was just a matter of time.

“You seem distracted, today, my treasure.”

Long, deceptively soft fingers caress my hair and turn my eyes away from the void.

“Are you bored, perhaps? I’m sorry if I haven’t been able to pay you much attention these past few days. Allow me to make it up to you.”

His lips take control of mine, and I surrender the same way I have surrendered all other times. So many times, in fact, that it is no longer a battle. It is not even a conquest. It is nothing at all. It does not matter that He pushes me against the rug, or that He divests me of my clothes, or that He then undresses Himself. His hands are not there. His mouth is not there. His weight is inexistent. His shadow is transparent. The body that moves inside mine does not really exist. The pleasure I feel is vague and fleeting. When it is over… It never really started.

  


~ * ~ * ~ * ~

  


The battle had just started when they spirited me away from the school using a Portkey and a traitorous friend. I landed inside a window-less dungeon and remained there in complete darkness until the last member of the Order was dead and what would become the Resistance retreated into the shadows. It took six days for that to happen. He came to me on the seventh day. And He became my world.

Starving, dehydrated and barely conscious after spending endless days feeling every Cruciatus and Aveda Kedavra cast by Him during battle, I put up no fight when He entered my prison and carried me away in His arms. 

We climbed, and climbed, and climbed, past endless corridors and infinite stairs. I was blind under the sunlight, and I remember wondering how the sun could still warm such a wretched earth. I also remember the hordes of Death Eaters that, drunk with victory, would kneel as He passed—holding me in His arms like an offering—and kiss the very ground He treaded on.

Seven years later they still do that: drop to their knees as He passes by. The only thing that has changed is that, when they look at me in His arms… They _know_.

  


~ * ~ * ~ * ~

  


“Come on, Harry, time to get dressed. You know Our Lord doesn’t like it when you’re late.”

That is Draco. His is the only voice that disturbs my silence aside from Him. Draco is in charge of looking after me. He does not trust anyone else with this task. His Death Eaters are naturally ambitious and violent, and He does not wish to break me more than necessary. 

Draco’s job is damage-control. He is here to make sure that I eat and drink my potions, and that I take a bath and dress every day. He is here to wake me up from my nightmares, and to heal me after His visits, and to keep me company those mornings I feel like any little thing will push me over the edge.

Draco is here because he has no other option. Too weak to follow in his father’s footsteps, he has been punished to serve the lowest of His servants all under the painful control of the slave runes tattooed down his back.

“I think we’ll dress you in white, today. What do you think?”

That Our Lord has discovered a sense of humor, dressing me as the proverbial lamb—or perhaps a virgin maiden. Both sacrificed to a greater power, pawns in an endless game.

  


~ * ~ * ~ * ~

  


And even if nobody else will ever know it, the smile on Ron Weasley’s—commander of the Resistance—face when he pushes the dagger deep into my chest as he hugs me against his body—effectively shattering the emerald lying against it and turning the tide of the war—is not the smile of a victorious leader, but the last echo of a more innocent childhood. He has not killed me for The Greater Good. He has done it because once we were best of friends.

The whisper shaping his lips is the last thing I see before closing my eyes to endless darkness.

_You can go now, Harry._


End file.
